France Bids Adieu to Working Overtime

In an effort to keep employees from burning out, the country has made answering work-related emails, texts and phone calls after hours illegal.

There's another thing to add to the list of things Americans can covet the French for: their food, their no-diet diets, their child rearing ... and their commitment to work-life balance.

That's because France now has a legally binding labor agreement that respects tech employees' right to disconnect when the workday is done, Business Insider reported, correcting an original report from another outlet claiming that France was making it illegal to answer emails after 6 p.m. The measure, which took six months of negotiating between employers and workers' unions, was made to keep managers from infringing on employee's "legally mandated rest period" with emails, text messages or phone calls, according to Business Insider. If it can't get done in their 35 hour workweek, the French seem to be saying, then it can wait.

"It's in the interests of employers that workers can reliably switch off from their jobs, otherwise, in the long run, they burn out," labor minister Ursula von der Leyen said then.

That burnout fear is real. As we've reported, technostress, or the feeling of being on call 24/7, can create an overwhelming sense of pressure on employees that hurts everyone. "This ever-present connection makes them feel like they’ve lost control over their time and space," OPEN Forum contributor Andrew Angus wrote. "Eventually, they’re overwhelmed by the volume and variation of their responsibilities, feel unable to accomplish tasks effectively and experience a high level of job dissatisfaction."